My Soul Eats with its Hands

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Did you know that all you need to make sauerkraut is cabbage + salt + time? True story. Not only is it so, so easy to make, it is SO GOOD FOR YOU. Homemade sauerkraut is ALIVE and chock full of probiotics- those beneficial bacteria that help maintain levels of happy flora in your gut. I know I am biased, because I have a long running love affair with all things pickled, but sauerkraut is delicious on all sorts of […]

You heard it here first: one day I will have a food truck that sells braised pig skin sandwiches. It will be WILDLY successful because pig skin is cheaper than dirt and deeply delicious. Almost everyone has heard of pork rinds, which are fried pig skin. Delicious as they are, pork rinds do not hold a candle to pig skin braised in tomato sauce. It is easily my favorite thing to eat. There is a roundness and a richness that lights […]

Sometimes the wheel does indeed benefit from a bit of re-invention. And in this case, when I say wheel, I mean potato. Very much the same way that chef Joel Robuchon is credited with having birthed the definitive mashed potato recipe, Chef Heston Blumenthal has created the ultimate french fry recipe. It requires multiple cooking and cooling stages and yields a truly spectacular fried potato now copied by chefs the world over: On a trip across The Pond last year, I […]

I hate the cold and I hate Winter. I do not ski and therefore I have no use for this poor excuse for a season. The one bright spot of Winter is that it is citrus season (a small consolation, at best). Because I am weird, I especially love grapefruit. In my CSA this week 2 Oro Blanco grapefruits arrived. They are some kind of seedless hybrid that may or may not actually be a grapefruit. That said, they are […]

Behold: the Husk burger in all its splendor. What is Husk, you ask? Well, it’s one of my most favorite restaurants in the whole world. The project at Husk is deceptively simple: to highlight foods of the South, sourcing everything (including truffles, salt and olive oil) from Southern producers with a commitment to sustainability. Tied into this is also a recovery of heirloom varieties of both meat and grains. The idea is not to slavishly adhere to tradition, but to […]

“There is then a hierarchy of plums that runs from the sublime to laxative”- Janet Clarkson (The Old Foodie) And so, where do Damsons fall on this sweeping spectrum of plums? With no disrespect to the regal Reine Claude (aka Green Gage), the Damson is an ancient fruit known to Pliny the Elder, and later lauded by Chaucer and Robert Boyle (among others)- by birthright I bequest top billing to the Damson. An ideal plum specimen is quivering with anticipation- potential […]

History is rich with the food of the poor. The recipes that arose out of exigency are pragmatic, judicious and, very often, deeply delicious. Nothing satisfies me more than taking the most simple and inexpensive foods and coaxing unexpected flavor from them. It is with this is mind that you can only imagine my excitement upon learning about Leather Britches, a magical and transformative method of preserving and then reconstituting beans: “To make leather britches, you string pole beans—like […]

There is something very comforting about the frothiness of a cocktail made with egg whites. This cocktail from Jeff Faile, the wine and spirits director of Washington D.C.’s Neighborhood Restaurant Group, takes that idea once step further and incorporates yogurt instead of egg white. I was intrigued when I saw it written up in a magazine, and clearly I had to try it. Spoiler alert: it’s delicious! THE NICOLAKI yield: 1 drink ingredients: 45 ml = 1.5 ounces vodka 30 […]

This will be the first post in honor of my newfound love/obsession, The Supersizers, a brilliant BBC show that explores the dining habits of the well-to-do/aristocracy in various periods in history. As is often the case, this show has quite a cult following and I am late to the game. But that never bothers me. I discover things when I am ready for them. Anyhoo…this show will undoubtably be the inspiration of many food projects to come. The second season […]

“You can never be too rich or too thin”- Wallis Simpson Clearly, La Simpson was not talking about sour cream. This falls into the category of “not quite a recipe”. You mix two ingredients together, wait 2 days and voila! super tangy, super rich sour cream. I’ve decided this is “blog post worthy” because it was a revelation to me how easy it is, and I think maybe it will be for you too. I’m just sharing the love. So, […]